


fighting til the death keeps us alive

by bstarship



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Peter Parker Has Nightmares, Precious Peter Parker, Protective Tony Stark, Sleepwalking, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Needs Sleep, and peter parker should stop sleeping, but what's new, cos he's gonna get himself killed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-05
Updated: 2020-05-05
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:07:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,854
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24011773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bstarship/pseuds/bstarship
Summary: “—be okay. I’ve got—I got… you.” Peter murmurs barely-coherent words, and Tony’s heart sinks at the sound. The kid talks about his dreams. He talks about petting dogs that look like rhinoceroses and dancing with life-size stalks of corn. But now, he’s speaking as though there’s someone there with him. Or, he’s reliving a memory. And it doesn’t sound peaceful.Tony bites his lip and thinks. Peter could wake up any minute now, or he could swing home in deep sleep without running into any issues. By this point, Tony has learned that Peter’s muscle memory is unlike any other. The fact that he can swing with his eyes closed is enough to give Tony three heart attacks.“Pl—you’ll—please.” Peter’s voice is soft, and when he sniffs, Tony finally understands that something is wrong. This is more than a dream to Peter. “Please don’t go.”orPeter sleepwalks. A lot. And Tony is always there to make sure he doesn't hurt himself—until one night, the pain isn't physical.
Relationships: Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Comments: 14
Kudos: 216





	fighting til the death keeps us alive

Tony is in the middle of soldering wires to a circuit board—something he could probably do blindfolded and with his hands tied, if he’s into that sort of thing—when FRIDAY cuts in.

It’s a rehearsed verse of, _“boss, he’s at it again”_ mixed with subtle inflections of disappointment. Tony had that programmed into her system in mid-2016, right around the time he first met Peter. These days, conversations with his AI are mostly spent over topics about the kid, and for the most part, it’s been quite a refreshing change.

That is until one day, it’s two in the morning and she’s waking him up to announce that Peter Parker has yet _another_ bullet wound. That’s when Tony realizes he misses the old days when he fixed low cylinder compressions in his roadster’s engine with JARVIS. Not that he doesn’t enjoy spending time with the kid—or, for FRIDAY’s sake, constantly hearing _about_ the kid—it’s rather that he now focuses at least 86% of his energy to a sixteen-year-old.

Rhodey had the nerve to call him a helicopter father a while back, and Tony spent a week avoiding Peter whenever he could. Once he realized that a week felt like an eternity, it occurred to Tony that he had dug himself in too deep to turn back now.

“ _It?_ ” Tony asks his AI. He has a feeling that he knows what she’s talking about, but it’s Peter—at the same time, it could be anything. The kid has a knack for getting himself into sticky situations.

 _“Mister Parker is sleepwalking again_.”

Tony sighs. Of course.

It only started a few months ago, Tony can recall, in the middle of an impromptu Tai Chi session that Pepper had recommended, accompanied by calming, serotonin-infusing music. FRIDAY alerted him that Peter was in the suit, and it would have been a normal message on any normal day. Except, at the time, it was nearly dawn, and Tony knew the kid loved his beauty sleep.

According to his suit’s interface, his vitals proved to be average, and Tony assumed that Peter changed things up and got his day started a bit early. It was when he tapped into the baby monitor that Tony noticed the kid wasn’t actually awake. From mumbling about Silver Sable as a ferocious unicorn to eating so many hot dogs that he _became_ a hot dog, Tony was able to pick up on the signs and symptoms. The kid was sleepwalking. He had put on the suit and swung around while _asleep_.

Tony installed a “Don’t Wake the Baby” protocol to keep him notified whenever Peter exhibited signs of REM in the suit.

Most times, it would end up fine. Peter has always found a way home and back in his bed before getting into serious trouble. Other times, FRIDAY has to notify Tony that his little favorite arachnid is in an alley, miraculously in one piece after falling from six stories high—which terrifies Tony to his very core, but somehow, there’s always something that breaks the fall. And then Peter wakes to find Iron Man standing over top of him, and he nearly shits himself.

It’s a fifty-fifty thing, but Tony is always stuck chewing his nails, waiting for further instructions as he decides on if he should climb in a suit or not.

The kid’s just lucky his mentor is practically nocturnal. Who else would be up at ungodly hours in the morning to scrape the Spider-Freak off of gum-stained pavement?

“Well, where is he, FRI?” Tony drops everything to check out the suit’s live feed at his desk. In crisp blue highlights, a hologram projects everything from the kid’s heartbeat down to how many breaths he’s taken in the past hour. Sure, it’s a little invasive in areas, but it’s useful whenever Peter gets himself into a pickle. And it happens more often than not.

 _“The Brooklyn Bridge,”_ she says a bit skeptically—like she doesn’t even trust her own knowledge. Or maybe she’s also confused as to why a sleepwalking teenage spider is on the Brooklyn Bridge at five in the morning.

Tony tosses his head back, closing his eyes and letting out a sharp, shaky breath while he tries to understand why the hell Peter is the way he is. “How? How am I supposed to keep this kid alive if he does shit like this? Jesus. Is he just walking along the side of the road and hailing taxis as Spider-Man? He probably thinks he’s going to Terabithia, doesn’t he?”

_“I can patch you through to his live audio, boss.”_

With a sigh, he says, “thanks, hun.”

The audio is staticky, like gale force winds blowing right into Tony’s ear, and the sounds make his stomach turn inside-out. He doesn’t hear talking at first, in fact, he almost doesn’t expect to hear anything. It’s nothing but constant _wooshes_ and _whomps_ of the wind against Peter’s body, furious and violent like a tempest on the ocean.

Tony thinks he hears the kid’s soft mumbles through the thick of it.

“FRI, enhance that voice for me, would ya?” he instructs, leaning himself down onto his desk—because, _damn_ , not only is he tired of Peter’s sleepwalking shenanigans, but he’s also tired in general. Most of the time, he stays up to make sure Peter is safe. Then again, Tony can’t sleep in general because he’s too afraid Peter will accidentally kill himself while they’re both asleep.

The slurred mumbles become more coherent after FRIDAY’s audio enhancement.

_“It’s—it’s… fault. Couldn’t save—I couldn’t save… s’my fault. Sorry, ma’am. You’ll be—be fine.”_

Tony’s eyebrows knit together. “Okay, weird,” he says. “Does he sound drunk to you? Kid sounds drunk.”

 _“His speech patterns are similar to those that one would experience when intoxicated,”_ she replies, _“but Mister Parker is in deep rapid eye movement. He’s clearly exhibiting signs of somnambulism.”_

Tony lets out a huff. “You don’t have t’get snarky on me,” he mutters under his breath. “What’s he doin’? What’s he seeing? C’mon, gimme a visual or something. I’m on the edge of my seat.”

_“You’re standing up, boss.”_

“Yeah, yeah.”

Peter’s vitals and suit information are pushed to the side to show the suit’s live visual feed. Tony had it installed well over six months ago after Peter’s kidnapped encounter with a crime boss. With Tony speaking in the kid’s ear, providing information and helping him escape would have been a lot easier if he had seen what Peter was seeing. Luckily, he made it out alive and only loosened one tooth in the process.

The live feed doesn’t show much—just a lot of darkness plus a few flickering lights in the distance. Even in 4k, Tony can hardly see a thing. It’s a moonless night; however, if he squints hard enough, he can make out the reflections of lights on water. The weird thing is, everything looks so far away.

“Can I get a street-view model of where his tracker is, please?” Tony asks as he scratches his chin. He feels bad for snooping, even if its main purpose is to protect one of the things he cares most about. Peter has unintentionally put himself in danger too many times for Tony to sit idly and do nothing about it. The kid is his responsibility whether he wants it or not.

Now, the live feed is pushed away, and a transparent, two-dimensional model of the suit’s tracker is the central focus. A little red dot blinks over where the Brooklyn Bridge is, and the map zooms in to be parallel with the bridge. _Jesus._

“You’ve gotta be fuckin’ kidding me.”

There, right on top of one of the two towers, Peter’s tracking dot flickers. The kid climbed a two-hundred-foot tower while _sleeping_. It hardly seems plausible.

Tony groans, swiping the model away so he’s back to see vitals and the live feed. He covers his face with his hands and takes a deep breath. “Literally, how the _hell?_ How the hell? This—this _night monkey_ is going to be the death of me. God—” He pinches between his brows.

 _“—be okay. I’ve got—I got… you.”_ Peter continues to murmur barely-coherent words, and Tony’s heart sinks at the sound. The kid talks about his dreams. He talks about petting dogs that look like rhinoceroses and dancing with life-size stalks of corn. But now, he’s speaking as though there’s someone there with him. Or, he’s reliving a memory. And it doesn’t sound peaceful.

Tony bites his lip and thinks. Peter could wake up any minute now, or he could swing home in deep sleep without running into any issues. By this point, Tony has learned that Peter’s muscle memory is unlike any other. The fact that he can swing with his eyes closed is enough to give Tony three heart attacks.

 _“Pl—you’ll—please.”_ Peter’s voice is soft, and when he sniffs, Tony finally understands that something is wrong. This is more than a dream to Peter. _“Please don’t go.”_

“FRIDAY?”

_“Yes, boss?”_

Tony steps away from his desk and shuts down all holograms. “How’s the paint job repair coming along on Mark Forty-Seven?” he asks her, snapping his fingers and clapping his hand down against his fist. It’s bothering him—the whole Peter thing, the _sleepwalking_ thing. It can’t keep going on like this.

 _“It is now in its drying phase,”_ the AI answers.

“Well, that’s convenient,” he says. “Okay, let’s take her out for a spin.”

* * *

The wind is enough to knock him off course. It doesn’t, but he’s unnerved by the force. Somewhere far in the distance, Peter Parker is asleep and sat upon a tower of the Brooklyn Bridge while the unruly winds pick up. Nature doesn’t care about superhuman spiders, even though it should care about this one in particular. Peter has been through enough.

Tony keeps listening to Peter as he flies toward the city. Sad words cut in and out in between soft cries, and the dejection in his voice only causes Tony to add more power to his thrusters. Peter sounds broken. He sounds sorry. He sounds like he’s grieving.

As Tony crosses over the East, his display narrows in on a small figure sitting on the left tower of the bridge. There’s no more speaking—only shaky breaths and the chattering of teeth.

He wants to scoop Peter up and take him back up to the compound, but he doesn’t want another voicemail from May ever again—not in a million years. The last time he did something with her permission, believe it or not, she took away his “Peter privileges”. No visitations from the kid for two weeks, and it was torture.

She didn’t know about Peter’s sleepwalking escapades. Tony didn’t want her to worry.

He hovers above the bridge's tower, lowering down slowly until he’s face-to-face with the arachnid-kid. Peter doesn’t blink. He doesn’t look up or react as though he hears Tony at all. In fact, he most likely isn’t aware of anything. His feet are slung over the edge, and his hands are clasped together in his lap. He’s staring down at the water as if heights mean nothing to him.

“Pete?” Tony asks, but he knows it’s not enough to get a response. “Can you hear me, kid?”

“You’ll be okay,” he whispers, staring beyond Tony’s presence like he’s caught up in his own world. “Can’t—I can’t save. Fault…s’my fault.”

Tony drifts over and plants himself on the tower beside Peter. He’s too afraid to step out of the suit while he’s this high up, so he settles beside him and lets his feet hang off as well.

The wind is unbearable. Every gust slams against his back, loud and heavy as he keeps still. The air is crisp and too cold for the kid shivering beside him. But Tony doesn’t dare touch him. He’s afraid that, if he does, Peter will wake up and lose his balance. Tony’s afraid of accidentally hurting him.

“What’s your fault, Pete?” he asks, watching the masked kid breathe unevenly.

Peter doesn’t answer questions in his sleep, but he inhales heavily at the sound of Tony’s voice. The eyes of Peter’s mask slowly close.

“You’ll—you’ll be…” A tremor rocks through Peter’s torso, and his voice wobbles. “—be okay. Don’t go. Don’t—”

“Peter,” Tony says firmly. “Pete, you gotta wake up; okay? Open your eyes for me, kid.”

The mask’s enormous white lenses open again. A single puff of air leaves his lips in response.

“That’s it,” Tony utters, smiling softly even though Peter has yet to acknowledge his presence. “You’re gonna wake up, and you’re not gonna get all freaked out; all right? It’s just you and me—” He glances down at the water. “—and a few hundred feet. Can ya give me anything, kiddo? ‘Cos, I really don’t wanna—”

“Couldn’t save,” Peter says.

“You couldn’t save who?” asks Tony, urging his tone to be stronger. “Who couldn’t you save, Pete?”

Peter lets out a whimper and closes his eyes again. His body sways with the wind, leaning forward and back until Tony slings an arm around him and pulls him to his side. Peter’s head falls limp onto the metal of Tony’s shoulder.

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Tony assures, rubbing his hand along Peter’s back to help calm his breathing. It’s never been like this before. His sleepwalking patterns have always been unpredictable, but Tony has never found Peter in a state like this.

They sit like that for a while. Tony never lets go of the embrace; he’s afraid of losing the kid to gravity if he does, but even for him, holding Peter eases the stress on his heart. There’s something reassuring about it. Tony hasn’t lost Peter, and he won’t as long as he keeps him close. That’s all he has to do—keep him close.

Peter hasn’t spoken in minutes, and his eyes are still shut. Tony is comforted by the fact that the episode has most likely ended, but he doesn’t want to move. The air is unfriendly, and the sights aren’t the most spectacular, yet there’s peace in the company and the silence. Peter is okay. He’s alive. He’s with Tony.

He’s alive.

After another few long moments, Peter stirs, shoulders shifting and face nustling against the cold metal of Tony’s chest. The kid groans and mumbles something.

“You okay there, Pete?”

He hums. “Yeah, m’fine.” And then his head snaps up. His eyes widen. “Mister Stark?” he asks. He glances around at the surroundings. There’s a tiny hint of light from where the sun is destined to rise on the horizon. “Where—what—?”

“You were sleepwalking,” Tony says. He’s still too afraid to let go of him. “Found you up here about twenty minutes ago just mumblin’ to yourself. You all right?”

“Am I—?” Peter pulls away from Tony, gaze focusing back on the river a few hundred feet below as he exhales. “I don’t know.”

Tony looks at him for a few uninterrupted seconds. He can’t figure out what’s running through the kid’s head. But there’s something wrong. Maybe Peter doesn’t know it, but Tony can sense it. 

“Let’s go,” Tony says as he stands.

Peter peers up at him, but he makes no effort to move. So, Tony reaches a hand out, and Peter takes it.

“Where are we going?” Peter asks. “Why am I—how’d I get here?”

“I’m hoping you’ll be able to answer that over a nice hot ‘n’ ready breakfast,” Tony replies, and his helmet shuts over his face. “Want a ride?”

Even with a mask on, Tony can tell that Peter’s confusion is strong. He’s disoriented, aloof, and slightly detached from reality. It’s nothing a stack of blueberry pancakes can’t fix. A pound of syrup can elicit the truth out of anyone.

Peter nods. “Y-yeah, sure. But don’t go too—”

Tony grabs ahold of him, takes off, and darts off into the early morning sky.

_“Fast!”_

* * *

They're at a diner in Queens, and Peter has been staring at his orange juice for ten minutes. He’s in normal clothes now, hair messy and slightly matted from wearing the mask for so long, and there are dark circles beneath his eyes. He sleeps, but he’s not well-slept. And there’s something bothering him. Tony doesn’t know how to bring it up.

“If you’re feelin’ up to it,” he begins, stirring a tiny bit of creamer into his coffee, “you could stay up at the compound tonight. It’ll keep ya from sleep-swinging to the end of Long Island and back—hopefully.”

It’s only a little after six in the morning. The sun will have completely risen by the time they leave the diner. All of the early risers are there with them. An 80-year-old sits at a booth with yesterday’s paper and a plate of flapjacks and bacon. A businessman only drinks coffee at the counter while he scrolls aimlessly on his phone. Two joggers in the far corner have stopped for fruit cups and English muffins. He and Peter stick out like a sore thumb.

Peter nods. “Yeah, sure,” he says dryly. He has hardly spared a glance at Tony since waking up.

“Pete—” Tony catches himself before speaking. As he thinks over what he’s going to say, the kid finally looks up at him. “I know you don’t really remember what goes on—y’know, when you sleepwalk—but right now, it kinda seems like there’s more that you’re not telling me. I thought we worked on this, on this whole _trust_ thing. _Tu parles, je parle_. Something’s buggin’ ya.”

Peter presses his lips together and looks down at his hands. He shakes his head. “No, I’m fine. I swear. Just—I don’t know,” he replies, shrugging.

There it is.

Tony raises a brow. “You don’t know.”

Peter meets his eyes again, and _gosh_ , the kid looks so broken, Tony considers buying him an entire country just to make him smile.

“Seems to me like you kinda do,” Tony remarks. If he were wearing sunglasses right now, he would be lowering them for an intimidation tactic. Unfortunately, he can’t conjure up a pair with his mind.

Peter doesn’t answer. He just lowers in on himself, cowering behind his silence so he doesn’t have to speak.

“You were talking earlier, Pete,” Tony says, “about saving someone. Or—or _not_ saving someone. Is that what this is about?”

Peter shifts uncomfortably.

Oh.

_Oh._

“Hey.” Tony’s voice lowers; it’s softer than he’s ever heard it before. It’s enough to get Peter to look up at him again with glassy eyes.

Peter breathes out shakily. “I-I couldn’t—I couldn’t save her,” he whispers. “I couldn’t—” Tears form in his eyes, and he stops himself from speaking.

“Hey, hey, kid, it’s okay,” Tony urges, reaching over and setting a hand on Peter’s. “I-It’s not about saving everybody; okay? You can’t save everybody.”

“I—” Peter’s lip trembles. “I should have saved her. I-I should have been able t’save her.”

“You don’t have to tell me what happened,” Tony says, frowning. “You don’t have to tell me anything else. But you don’t need to hold this guilt on your shoulders. We take on this mantle expecting to be a hero to everyone, but saving lives, Pete—it’s so hard. What’s important is that you were there with her.”

A few tears slip down Peter’s cheeks.

“You made sure she wasn’t alone,” continues Tony. “You did all that you could.”

“I-I could’ve done more.”

He sighs. He’s been here before. He’s experienced every single triggering thought racing through the kid’s brain. It’s not easy—it never will be.

Peter sniffs and wipes at his nose with his sleeve. “I’m never gonna be good enough,” he mumbles. “I’m—I’m never gonna be what they want me to be. I’m never gonna be a hero.”

“Pete.”

Peter can’t look at Tony.

“Even if you didn’t have these powers—” Tony says, “even if you didn’t climb walls and beat up criminals just because you’re too lazy to do your Physics homework, you’d still be a hero. You know why?”

With another sniff, Peter shakes his head.

“Your aunt could tell you, I bet,” Tony continues as he sits back against the booth. “You’ve saved her more times than she’s ever let on, and I know it. And I could tell you, too.”

Peter raises an eyebrow gently.

Tony smiles. “Hell, kid, you’re _my_ hero. I’m fucked up as it is. I was constantly looking for ways to better myself with technology or other crap inventions that only Pepper pretended to give a shit about. And then I met you, and I was an asshole. I still am. But, dare I say it, Parker, I’m a changed man because of you. Not to make this whole thing about me, but I’d say I’m much better off now that I know you. You make living a lot fuckin’ better, I’ll tell you that.”

Peter’s eyes are wide and teary again, but the corner of his lips quirk up at Tony’s words. “Y-you really—you mean that?”

“Yeah, of course,” Tony says. “Remember? We got that trust thing going on. I wouldn’t sell you lies. I’m an honest man when I want to be.”

Peter seems relieved by the words; however, his expression hardly changes.

“It’s gonna eat you up for a while, Pete,” Tony tells him. “It’s gonna keep you up at night when you don’t want it to. But you’re human. You are not the keeper of everyone in New York. Maybe you don’t think that you’re good enough—you don’t need to be good enough. You don’t need to hold yourself to these standards. You’re _good,_ kiddo. You have a good heart, a good mind, and good intentions. You’re selfless. You’re charismatic. You brighten everyone’s day. You make this ugly-ass city better just by existing in it. You don’t need to be what _they_ want you to be because you’re already there for them. They’re just blind if they don’t see it.”

Tony watches as Peter rubs at his tear-stained cheeks. He’s keeping his crying silent, but he can’t hide it anymore. There’s nothing that breaks Tony’s heart more than seeing Peter this way. He can’t save everyone, and it will always be hard.

“Thank you,” Peter whispers, trying his best to smile through his tears, “for everything, Mister Stark. You’re my hero, too.”

Tony’s chest fills with warmth, and he smiles. He’d give anything for the kid to be happy. He’d give anything for Peter. “Let’s get you home,” he says, sliding out of the booth, but not before slapping a handful of cash onto the table. “May’ll have my ass if you’re not back in time for school.”

“Can I still come by the compound tonight?” Peter asks as he stands.

“If we’re both not grounded, then yeah, kid,” Tony replies, grinning. He slings an arm around Peter’s shoulders. “You’re always welcome.”

“I’m Iron Man’s hero, huh?”

Tony ruffles the kid’s hair. He’s still smiling. “Shut up, _dork_.”

**Author's Note:**

> [come talk to me on tumblr](https://itsybitsyspiderling.tumblr.com/)


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